Senior Research Fellow, Marie Curie Fellow
I am a scientist with a PhD in Psychology and broad interests and professional expertise.
Over the last decade, I have been developing a novel line of transdisciplinary research that cuts across several fields of psychology, biology, social sciences and philosophy of science. My empirical studies involve humans of different ages and sociocultural backgrounds and more than 10 different species, in particular, nonhuman primates.
A central concern of my research is to critically analyse, improve and redevelop metatheories, methodologies and research tools for better understanding and help finding solutions for real-world problems. My research has been awarded several prizes and research grants for its originality, for addressing fundamental research problems and for promoting and enabling interdisciplinary collaborative research.
For more information see my Personal Website.
During my diploma (BSc and MSc) studies at Humboldt-University Berlin, I specialised in Social and Personality Psychology, Personnel and Management Development, Organisational Psychology and Engineering Psychology, and I also studied Economics and Economic Law. I have been working in management development in the U.K. headquarters of an international steel-working company and studied human-computer interaction in a project conducted in collaboration with Daimler Chrysler Services, Germany.
Following my passion for behavioural and psychological research in human and nonhuman primates, I went to the Max-Planck-Institute for Evolutionary Psychology (Department of Comparative and Developmental Psychology and Wolfgang Köhler Primate Research Center) in Leipzig (2003-2005), where I started my research on the theoretical and methodological foundations of research on individuals. I demonstrated the application of these foundations in a comprehensive empirical study on "Personality in the Great Apes" that received two research prizes. Since then, I have been continuously extending this line of research in projects on individual behaviour and "personality" involving young children and adults with different sociocultural backgrounds and more than 10 different species, especially nonhuman primates.
I hold a PhD in Psychology from Free University Berlin (2009), where I founded and headed the research group Comparative Differential and Personality Psychology (2010-2013), funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG). I have been a lecturer at Humboldt-University and Free University Berlin (2006-2013) and a visiting scholar at the Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies, National Research Council of Italy (ISTC-CNR) in Rome (2011-2013).
Currently, I am a Senior Research Fellow funded by the Marie Curie Fellowship programme of the European Commission. I am working on a multi-method project in which I apply and extend my line of research to explore the mental processes by which people generate quantitative assessments on standardised questionnaires. A central concern is to investigate implicit biases derived from stereotypical beliefs about gender and ethnicity and the role that standardised survey tools may play in their manifestation in enquiries.
My line of research is transdisciplinary and focuses on the philosophical, metatheoretical and methodological foundations of research on individuals and their personality as well as and on the human socio-cognitive abilities to develop pertinent mental and social representations (e.g., Uher, 2013, 2015a,b,c,d). I employ a broad portfolio of methods, including behavioural observations in real-life settings, experimental studies and audiovisual and computerised methods for the detailed recording of individual behaviours for which I have developed efficient coding technologies (Uher, Addessi & Visalberghi, 2013). I have also developed dynamic online tools for collecting standardised assessments (e.g., Uher, 2011, Uher, Werner & Gosselt, 2013).
My research comprises both explorations of individuals and their “personality” in and of themselves and explorations of the social beliefs, ideas and values that humans in different sociocultural communities develop, propagate and maintain about individuals and their “personality” . This explicit differentiation of the phenomena under exploration is essential because these social belief systems influence people's everyday practices-such as their judgements and social categorisations of individuals.
The abilities of humans to quickly form impressions of other individuals and to develop social category systems and a pertinent everyday vocabulary could have been of enormous importance in human evolution: Such abilities enabled our ancestors to trade with unknown individuals of foreign cultures and were essential prerequisites for the domestication of animals. By exploring humans' impression formation and their assessments of individuals from other species that are phylogenetically related yet have different social and behavioural systems and with which humans are much less acquainted than they are with individuals of their own species, attribution biases derived from stereotypical beliefs and ideas about human individuals become particularly apparent (Uher, Werner & Gosselt, 2013; Uher & Visalberghi, 2016).
My current research project aims to explore how people perceive and judge the individual behaviours and ‘personality’ of adults in everyday contexts and the ways in which implicit biases related to gender and ethnicity manifest in ‘personality’ assessments. A further aim is to investigate how people understand and use questionnaires for generating standardised assessments of individuals. The Transdisciplinary Philosophy-of-Science Paradigm for Research on Individuals (TPS-Paradigm, Uher, 2013, 2015a,b,c,d), its behavioural research methodologies (Uher, 2015e) and the cutting-edge methods and technologies of Subjective Evidence-Based Ethnography (SEBE; Lahlou, 2011) are applied to systematically deconstruct the requirements that standardised assessment tasks impose on respondents and to reconstruct the social knowledge and the psychical processes involved therein. These processes are still largely unknown despite the fact that standardised questionnaires have become the primary tool of investigation in many fields of psychology and the social sciences.
At LSE, I contribute to lectures and seminars in the MSc Programme Psychology of Economic Life.
Between 2006 and 2013, I have been teaching and examining students of psychology in seminars and lectures at Humboldt-University and Free University Berlin. In 2012, I was nominated for the Prize for Excellent Teaching. I have supervised and examined Bachelor, Master, Diploma and PhD theses of students from various European universities and have given more than 20 guest lectures for Master and PhD students of different disciplines at various research institutions in Europe.
I am committed to high-quality teaching. I foster inclusive learning settings by actively involving students in lectures, seminars and ongoing research projects to promote their abilities to transfer the knowledge and skills they acquire at university to real-world settings.
Google scholar profile
Research papers on the Transdisciplinary Philosophy-of-Science Paradigm for Research on Individuals (TPS-Paradigm)
Uher, J. (in press). What is behaviour? And (when) is language behaviour? Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour. [pdf] DOI: 10.1111/jtsb.12104
Uher, J. (2016). Exploring the workings of the psyche: Metatheoretical and methodological foundations. Annals of Theoretical Psychology, 13, 299-324. [pdf] DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-21094-0_18
Uher, J. (2015a). Conceiving "personality": Psychologists’ challenges and basic fundamentals of the Transdisciplinary Philosophy-of-Science Paradigm for Research on Individuals. Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science, 49, 398-458. [pdf] DOI:10.1007/s12124-014-9283-1 [IF 1.11]
Uher, J. (2015b). Developing "personality" taxonomies: Metatheoretical and methodological rationales underlying selection approaches, methods of data generation and reduction principles. Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science, 49. [pdf] DOI:10.1007/s12124-014-9280-4 [IF 1.11]
Uher, J. (2015c). Interpreting "personality" taxonomies: Why previous models cannot capture individual-specific experiencing, behaviour, functioning and development. Major taxonomic tasks still lay ahead. Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science, 49. [pdf] DOI:10.1007/s12124-014-9281-3 [IF 1.11]
Uher, J. (2015d). Agency enabled by the Psyche: Explorations using the Transdisciplinary Philosophy-of-Science Paradigm for Research on Individuals. Annals of Theoretical Psychology, 12, 177-228. [pdf] DOI:10.1007/978-3-319-10130-9_13
Uher, J. (2015e). Comparing individuals within and across situations, groups and species: Metatheoretical and methodological foundations demonstrated in primate behaviour. In D. Emmans & A. Laihinen (Eds.). Comparative Neuropsychology and Brain Imaging (Vol. 2), Series Neuropsychology: An Interdisciplinary Approach. (chapter 14, pp. 223-284). Berlin: Lit Verlag.[pdf] ISBN 978-3-643-90653-3 DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.1.3848.8169
Uher, J. (2014). Fundamental challenges of contemporary "personality" research. Physics of Life Reviews, 11, 695-696. [pdf] DOI:10.1016/j.plrev.2014.10.005 [IF 9.48]
Uher, J. (2013). Personality psychology: Lexical approaches, assessment methods, and trait concepts reveal only half of the story. Why it is time for a paradigm shift. Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science, 47, 1-55. [pdf] DOI:10.1007/s12124-013-9230-6 [IF 1.11]
Uher, J. (2011a). Individual behavioral phenotypes: An integrative meta-theoretical framework. Why 'behavioral syndromes' are not analogues of 'personality'. Developmental Psychobiology, 53, 521–548. [pdf] DOI:10.1002/dev.20544 [IF 3.16]
Uher, J. (2008a). Comparative personality research: Methodological approaches (Target article). European Journal of Personality, 22, 427-455.[pdf] DOI:10.1002/per.680 [IF 3.35]
Uher, J. (2008b). Three methodological core issues of comparative personality research. European Journal of Personality, 22, 475-496. [pdf] DOI:10.1002/per.688 [IF 3.35]
Empirical applications of the Transdisciplinary Philosophy-of-Science Paradigm for Research on Individuals (TPS-Paradigm)
Uher, J., & Visalberghi, E. (2016).Observations versus assessments of personality: A five-method multi-species study reveals numerous biases in ratings and methodological limitations of standardised assessments. Journal of Research in Personality, 61, 61-79. [pdf] [Supplemental Material] DOI: 10.1016/j.jrp.2016.02.003
Uher, J. (2015e). Comparing individuals within and across situations, groups and species: Metatheoretical and methodological foundations demonstrated in primate behaviour. In D. Emmans & A. Laihinen (Eds.). Comparative Neuropsychology and Brain Imaging (Vol. 2), Series Neuropsychology: An Interdisciplinary Approach. (chapter 14, pp. 223-284). Berlin: Lit Verlag.[pdf] ISBN 978-3-643-90653-3 DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.1.3848.8169
Uher, J., Werner, C. S., & Gosselt, K. (2013). From observations of individual behaviour to social representations of personality: Developmental pathways, attribution biases, and limitations of questionnaire methods. Journal of Research in Personality, 47, 647–667. [pdf] DOI:10.1016/j.jrp.2013.03.006 [IF 2.72]
Uher, J., Addessi, E., & Visalberghi, E. (2013). Contextualised behavioural measurements of personality differences obtained in behavioural tests and social observations in adult capuchin monkeys (Cebus apella). Journal of Research in Personality, 47, 427-444. [pdf]; pdf supplemental material] DOI:10.1016/j.jrp.2013.01.013 [IF 2.72]
Uher, J. (2011b). Personality in nonhuman primates: What can we learn from human personality psychology? In A. Weiss, J. King, & L. Murray (Eds.). Personality and Temperament in Nonhuman Primates (pp. 41-76). New York, NY: Springer. [pdf] DOI:10.1007/978-1-4614-0176-6_3
Uher, J. & Asendorpf, J.B. (2008). Personality assessment in the Great Apes: Comparing ecologically valid behavior measures, behavior ratings, and adjective ratings. Journal of Research in Personality, 42, 821-838. [pdf] DOI:10.1016/j.jrp.2007.10.004 [IF 2.72]
Uher, J., Asendorpf, J.B., & Call, J. (2008). Personality in the behaviour of great apes: Temporal stability, cross-situational consistency and coherence in response. Animal Behaviour, 75, 99-112. [pdf] DOI:10.1016/j.anbehav.2007.04.018 [IF 3.16]
Research papers on behavioural inhibition
Uher, J. & Call, J. (2008). How the Great Apes (Pan troglodytes, Pongo pygmaeus, Pan paniscus, and Gorilla gorilla) perform on the reversed reward contingency task II: Transfer to new quantities, long-term retention, and the impact of quantity ratios. Journal of Comparative Psychology, 122, 204-212.[pdf] DOI:10.1037/0735-7036.122.2.204 [IF 2.31]
Vlamings, P.H.J.M., Uher, J., & Call, J. (2006). How the Great Apes (Pan troglodytes, Pongo pygmaeus, Pan paniscus, and Gorilla gorilla) perform on the reversed contingency task: The effects of food quantity and food visibility. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 32, 60-70. [pdf] DOI:10.1037/0097-7403.32.1.60 [IF 1.76]